


The Gravity Theory of Alcoholism

by ryssabeth



Series: Novelesque Diary [8]
Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - College/University, M/M, University
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-25
Updated: 2013-02-25
Packaged: 2017-12-03 15:35:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 692
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/699817
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ryssabeth/pseuds/ryssabeth
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There was a precipice.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Gravity Theory of Alcoholism

Grantaire watches as Enjolras flips books closed, placing them back upon the closest stack, grabbing bottles—empty, or mostly there—and disappearing into the kitchen to throw them away. After his shouts and murmurs (sounding a lot like an ocean, the push and pull of the tide that brought Grantaire out of bed in the first place), he has yet to say much of anything, just dropped his coat in a puddle near the door and began to clean.

 _You don’t have to_ , he wants to say. _I can get it later_.

But he won’t.

He won’t get it later. To do that, he has to get up. To get up, he has to verify his existence. And when that happens, he’ll have to talk.

And Grantaire wants to do anything but talk.

Enjolras putters around, going down the hallway (books are scattered there, not opened so much as tossed) and returning, starting on the living room, pushing pencils and papers aside, shoving books against the wall to make paths, and his eyes stray to everything except where Grantaire sits on the couch.

A protest catches in his throat when Enjolras adjusts and adds to the stacks obscuring his radio, digging behind them to grab loose novels—ah, there’s _A Tale of Two Cities_ —and Grantaire’s phone.

It had been buried the moment he returned from the bar. Buried and left and not at all checked because—

Enjolras swipes his thumb across the screen, stepping away from the half-neatened books stacks, and places the phone, face down, on the coffee table, and stands, arms crossed over his chest.

_“You have three new voice messages. New message:_

_“You’re not at home, which is apparently justifiable,”_ Enjolras says—or had said. His voice says. _“For some reason. It would be actually justifiable if you would talk to me, and tell me what I did, I am so sorry if I was too forward._

_“Jesus Christ, just call me back.”_

_“New message:—_ “

Enjolras hangs up on Grantaire’s voicemail, holding out his phone with more of the stony silence that is entirely appropriate of a man so lovingly rendered from marble and given the breath of life. He takes the offered phone and tucks it in the pocket of his sweatpants.

(And he notes, with a flinch, that there are far too many text messages waiting to be read.)

“I’m sorry I distressed you,” Enjolras’ murmurs, a flat drop of words that clatter to the table and drop to the floor, staring Grantaire in the face.

“Stop apologising,” nails scrape along the lining of this throat when he speaks. He clears his throat to try and cough them up. “You didn’t—I didn’t mean to take away your autonomy. I know how much you value that.”

(This hangover his killing him, he’d forgotten what it was like to have one, and it is _killing_ him.

Or maybe that’s just Enjolras, statuesque fingers closing slowly upon his throat.)

“You implied I don’t know all the facts,” the shape that is Enjolras shifts, away from the coffee table, and the place on the couch next to him dips with his weight. “Okay. Tell me things I don’t know. Help me understand.”

“You’re not reading right,” Grantaire coughs out, “or something. Shit, Apollo, you missed _something_. I’ve lied to you—apparently I’ve lied to you. I marketed myself as someone whole, or something, and you _fell for it_. I’m sorry. I’m sorry—I lied to you. I lied to you.”

Enjolras sighs, and his fingers find the back of his hand, resting there, unmoving. He’s warmer than marble. But Grantaire already knew that—it’s probably the hangover talking. “Shut up.” Those same fingers wrap around his hand. “Shut up,” and this time it sounds more fond. “Shut up. But talk to me.”

“Those sound like two mutually exclusive things.”

(His own voice comes out a wheeze, the desperate words _I love you_ wrapping around his neck like a noose, hanging him high for everyone to see.)

“Talk to me,” Enjolras repeats.

“There was a precipice,” Grantaire says, the noose tightening as he walks to the gallows, “and I fell.”


End file.
